Charles II of England died in 1685, killed by his well-meaning doctors.
He had some sort of mild stroke while shaving one morning, something from which he very likely would have recovered nowadays. But fourteen desperate physicians, feeling serious pressure to keep him alive, tried to revive him. It was necessary to get his humors in balance, of course. These would have been the best doctors in the land.
Here’s what treatments were administered, according to a description the chief physician, Sir Charles Scarburgh, recorded in his diary:
He was bled a pint of blood.
His shoulder was cut and 8 ounces more blood was sucked out by “cupping.” In this charming procedure, cuts were made and cylinders shaped like wine glasses were put over the cuts and then flamed to expel air—they acted as suction devices to draw out blood.
Then he was given an emetic (something to make him vomit), a purgative (something taken orally to induce, well, things to swiften in the digestive tract), and another purgative, and an enema (another, um, more invasive way to get him to evacuate his bowels). Another enema. Two hours later, another purgative.
Unfortunately for the king, he stirred a bit, which made his ecstatic doctors feel he would benefit from more blood-letting.
I’ll let Sir Charles take over from here:
“The king’s scalp was shaved and a blister raised.” Sorry, Sir Charles, but I can’t resist interjecting here. The blisters he was given contained smooshed Spanishfly (cantharis is a type of blister beetle that is neither Spanish nor a fly), which not only raises blisters but also passes quickly into the system and irritates the urinary tract, causing more frequent urination. Oh and also delirium, convulsions, vomiting, extreme gastrointestinal upset, and death. (I blogged about Spanishfly here and also here.) All right, Sir Charles, go on. “A sneezing powder of hellebore was administered.” How did this work? They took the powdered form of the poisonous white hellebore lily and blew it up the king’s nostrils to initiate sneezing. “A plaster of burgundy pitch and pigeon dung was applied to the feet. Medicaments included melon seeds, manna, slippery-elm, black cherry water, lime flowers, lily of the valley, peony, lavender, and dissolved pearls.”
By the next morning the king was, miraculously, still alive. Encouraged by their treatment protocol, the doctors decided he would benefit from more bleeding, and opened up both jugular veins.
But then he got worse. So they administered “forty drops of extract of human skull.”
More medicaments. Then, as a last ditch effort, ammonia was forced down the king’s throat. At last the exhausted king finally expired—probably of a brain hemorrhage.